Acacia Rubid Investigation Report

Effect of Water Availability on Germination of Acacia rubida and Swainsona formosa Seeds
Question
The aim of this experiment is to investigate whether water availability prior germination affects Acacia rubida and Swainsona formosa seed germination. We will control the water availability by pre-soaking time.
Hypotheses
Null hypotheses
• Seed germination speed will not differ between long and short soaking time.
• Change in soaking time will have same effect on A. rubida and S. formosa seeds.
Alternative hypotheses
• Seed germination speed with long soaking time will differ from the speed with short soaking time.
• Change in soaking time will have different effect on A. rubida and S. formosa seeds.
Predictions
High water availability will stimulate germination process, so seeds will germinate faster in respond to long soaking time. Since A. rubida is distributed in elevated areas with high precipitation (Maslin and Pedley, 1988), its seeds should be sensitive to high water availability. S. formosa might be more sensitive to water availability since it grows in sandy or on stony ground in dry …show more content…
Hence the effect was not significant with the large deviation of data, if there was any effect of soaking. A larger sample size and longer growing time are required to make statistically significant conclusions.
The choice of soaking times might need to change as well. Maybe 20 minutes was not long enough for seeds to react differently from 1 minute soaking. Tapingkae, Taji and Kristiansen (2007) soaked the S. formosa seeds overnight and reported almost 100% germination within 48 hours.
It can be concluded from this experiment that soaking time does not affect germination of A. rubida and S. formosa seeds, and change in soaking time will have no different effect on A. rubida and S. formosa